An Evening Alone...

My evening was interesting. My step mom has been in Vegas this week and last night my dad had to go to the sleep lab for the night.

For those of you who don't know...I have more recently moved back home with my daughter, Alexa, while my pending divorce gets finalized.

I was thinking, yippee, the house to myself. The only problem, I forgot I don't like being alone in the house at night - after dark more specifically. But I did okay...I put Alexa to bed and then I got cozy in bed and read for a while before calling it a night. Everything seemed to be flowing smoothly until Alexa woke up at 1:30am, screaming.

Startled and half asleep, I jumped out of bed to figure out what was wrong. She doesn't typically wake up in the middle of the night unless she has to go to the bathroom or has already had an accident in her bed. Nope...the blood curdling screams of terror were all for a drink of water. A drink of water??? That's it? I got her a drink of water and commenced trying to get her wrangled back into bed. Of course, she wanted to go into my bed. It's 1:30 in the morning and I'm exhausted...I'm not fighting this one, okay, crawl into bed with me. Bad idea. Nothing was making this kid happy...stinker bell (her alter ego) had emerged. I managed to pull her up off the floor from the space she had wedged herself into between the bed and the wall. Back to her bedroom we go, and her own bed.

Alexa was laying there peacefully and I was rubbing her back when all of a sudden I heard this high pitched, evil giggle and "Elmo needs a good stretch." My heart was racing and I was ready for a fight, with who I wasn't sure. Gigi (the dog) must have tried playing with the damn Elmo doll and it started making noises. Of course, Alexa heard Elmo and now she wanted me to go get it for her. What??? Go out into the dark living room, alone, to get that evil little doll...I'll pass.

Okay, I can't show my child that I'm scared of Elmo or the dark...so I took a deep breath, stood up and I went and got it. I wasn't sure what to expect but I knew there were 3 critters running around the house, making noises, it was dark, and I was scared and trying to put on a brave front. By this point, I have had enough.

It's now 2am...I decide to just pull Alexa back into bed with me and of course Gigi (Schnoodle) and Griffen (Shih tzu) follow. The four of us are packed like sardines into my queen size bed...it's like I'm a magnet pulling all three of them close to me...might as well prepare to wake up with a kink cause you know its coming.